Let’s get this out of the way. I missed the original airing of 316 tonight and am playing catch-up like the little tomato in Mia Wallace’s joke. To get tonight’s column done in the most expeditious way possible, it’s another “real time diary.” I hear this week’s show is a doozy, so let’s get on with it.

I wasn’t feeling this episode at all. Despite being the episode where the most happened in a while, it felt very mechanical, like they said “OK lets move everything into place so X, Y and Z can happen over the next few episodes”. There were some things in this episode that really should have had more impact than they did.

Are we supposed to think that Kate killed Aaron? And that Jack slept with her KNOWING that she did! I know Jack is often probe to stupidity since season 2, but this seemed extra questionable. If Kate gave Aaron to the Australian Granny you’d think she’d be able to say so to Jack. Instead she was all cryptic (even more than usual!) which makes you think the worst.

Kate: Don’t ever ask what horrible thing I did to that child. Now come over here and make love to me!

I think it’s safe to assume that the pre-flight back stories for Kate, Sayid, Hurley and Ben will be fodder for future character-centric episodes.

With Kate, somebody obviously kidnap or is threatening Aaron to force Kate to go on the flight.

I’m guessing Ben’s story has something to do with Desmond and Penny and his threat to kill Penny.

I’m curious who else was transported to the Island besides the Oceanic Six – Lepidus? The agent accompanying Sayid? The other airline passenger in business/first class? The flight attendents. Does one have to be previously on the Island? All questions which I’m hoping they’ll answer.

“Are we supposed to think that Kate killed Aaron? And that Jack slept with her KNOWING that she did!”

Well, it seems we’re certainly not supposed to think that her killing Aaron is out of the question, but it’s certainly a mystery. Maybe she left Aaron with Sawyer’s baby-momma: that might explain why she’s so insistent that Jack not press the subject, since her off-island on-behalf-of-Sawyer activities (whatever they were) precipitated all sorts of badness between Jack and Kate.

But Sun has a kid, too. What did she do with her daughter? Maybe Kate left Aaron with some going-to-the-island daycare that Sun had set up.

Thinking about it, what I really liked about this episode is how it in addition to advancing the plot from point A to point B pretty well (which isn’t trivial; lots of other shows have from time to time been really slow or boring in moving their plots forward) it also planted a few new mysteries for us to obsess over:

– Where’s Aaron?
– How did Sayyid come to be on the flight?
– Who beat up Ben?
– How did Hurley come to be on the flight (especially if it wasn’t Ben)?

In addition to all the “normal” LOST-mysteries that this episode brings up (What happened to the plane? What/when are the isalnd returnees now? What’s up with Jin? What’s going to happen with Desmond?) these particular new “mini-mysteries” seem to be exactly the kind that can be solved comparatively quickly in future flashback/flashforward episodes, which, I admit, really hooks me for watching future episodes!

Am I the only one not feeling the Bryan K. Vaughn episodes? Did he write this one as well? The last few episodes this season have felt “odd” to me. Last nights had a LOT of coincidences in it. I mean, the whole Granddad thing, JUST to get his father’s shoes? He just happened to have them in his suitcase cause he packed quickly? Doesn’t Jack own anything of his fathers? Or was I missing something to say there was more going on there then just “get shoes, have item for John.” And The pilot? Hurley buying up all the seats on the plane so people wouldn’t die (but then having lots of people in the back anyway?) Jin not recognizing his friends until they called his name? I don’t know. Didn’t do it for me. I for one thought the whole Ben thing had something to do with Aaron, and Kate. Since Ben said he had to go tie up a loose end, and then suddenly Kate is without Aaron; and is crying, and Ben said he was the one going after Aaron. BUT I’m probably totally wrong there, since he was all covered in blood. I hope Penny isn’t dead though! But hopefully next week will be good, since they finally reveal the whole point of the island! (Or so they say?) Do you think Christian is really alive? I’m not sure. My reasoning is, when he was telling Locke what he needed to do last week, he wouldn’t help Locke up when he asked. It’s almost like he’s some illusion, or a ghost, or something, and can give commentary, but can’t actually “do anything” cause uh, he’s not really there?

Tommy,
Sun’s kid is being cared for by Sun’s mom back in Korea. When Sun starts to go kill Ben at the marina Mrs. Paik phones Sun and gets Ji Yeon to talk to her mom, probably to guilt Sun into coming back sooner.

I tend to think Richard’s right; that Ben was wounded when he tried (perhaps successfully) to kill Penny; that’s why Ben makes reference to fulfilling a promise to an old friend (or words to that effect), which means his promise to Widmore that he Ben would kill Widmore’s daughter.

There is a certain stilted qualify about this season, probably because the writers are desperately trying to squeeze in all the plot points they need to cover in this season and the next.

I think that though Sun was nerving herself up to kill Ben (though her motives for blaming Ben for Jin’s death are fuzzy), she forced herself into mommy-mode and tried to soothe Ji Yeon with talk of a playmate.

Probably something will come of it down the line, tho none of us will really catch on in time (pun intended).

“Am I the only one not feeling the Bryan K. Vaughn episodes? Did he write this one as well?”

He was listed as Producer but not one of the two writers, so I’m not sure how much control he had on the story.

“Doesn’t Jack own anything of his fathers? ”

I was always under the impression that Jack has had nothing to do with his father for so long that he probably wouldn’t have anything to remind him of his dad.

“And The pilot? Hurley buying up all the seats on the plane so people wouldn’t die (but then having lots of people in the back anyway?)”

Yeah, that confused me as well. I see the new character was sitting up in first class along with the female officer (FBI?) with Sayid

“I hope Penny isn’t dead though!”

I hope so to but I can just as easily see her dying so that the only happy relationship in the show would be ruined. I recall a lot of viewers getting surprised that the writers had happily tied up the Penny/Desmond story last year and this could be a way of them saying; “uh, wait-a-minute…”

Also, Penny’s death would probably be the only way to get Desmond back to the island.

I think the only new characters will be those in contact with the Oceanic Six when the time flash occurred, which puts them on the island without the plane or other passengers. The pilot might be with them too because of his previous contact with the island, and the person guarding Sayid.

Now they’re all back during the Darma era. Jin might have been there for some time. (I didn’t see him as hesitating to recognize his old friends. He just seemed surprised to see them.)

If the other Islanders stopped shifting through time when Locke fixed the lever, they all might have had to infiltrate and adapt.

I don’t think the time-hoppers are in the 1970s. I think they have blended in with the Dharma Initiative sometime in the mid-1980s. Locke moving the ancient wheel back on its axis and/or the Oceanic 5 on their way back to the island has “calmed” the time-shifting down, allowing the time-hoppers to be in one period for a longer sequence of time. Since Charlotte was born in 1979, and she claims to have seen “wild man” Faraday when she was a little girl on the island, I place the time-hoppers circa 1985.

I think this season has been outstanding because there are enough clues out there now that you can conceivably solve everything, and yet still have a gazillion questions on the brain burner.

Seth Hurley hit it on the head. Hurley bought the remaining tickets on the flight, which just happened to be 78 tickets. Not that crazy that the flight would have had many passengers booked in advance and thus their seats already sold and out of Hurley’s saving hands.

I am assuming Sayyid turned himself in for the murder Hurley was being held for, thus Hurley was released and Sayyid was arrested. Perhaps he was being transported home via this flight, as Kate was via the original flight. It is a kinda-sorta reaching explaination, but it makes sense for the most part.

The pilot, if you recall, was supposed to be the pilot of the plane that got them all there the first time. It definitely wasn’t just irony that he was flying this plane.

My girlfriend thinks that with Jin being dressed as a Dharma member that the “original others” will end up consisting of all the original flight survivors. I’m not so sure, but it could be. If the time traveling has stopped, they definitely aren’t in the 2000’s, so it is possible.

@Jim Aquino- with the time travel in play, they could now jump back far enough to see the landing of The Black Rock, the heyday of the Four-Toed Statue builders & their Smokey-protected temple, or the origin of the skeleton couple from Season 1.

@William Sims- Sawyer & the gang jumped ahead +3 years after the return of the O6 to find the wreckage & canoes. So did the O6 group take shots at them on the water & which one did Juliet shoot at and hit?

Christian Shepard isn’t alive. At least, we aren’t led to believe he is. There is evidence in the episode where Locke moves the wheel. Christian says he cannot help Locke move it- probably because he’s a ghost.

I definitely think that Ben’s “unfinished business” involved Penny Widmore and his “old friend” is Charles. I don’t know who, but whoever got in his way gave Ben a beating. I wonder if he was successful, though.

I don’t get the flash causing everyone to just drop onto the island. This definitely isn’t the same set of circumstances that brought the Oceanic flight to the island.

BTW, with flashes still happening, does that mean that some of the people stuck in time have died from the effects?

I don’t think (hope) that Ben killed Penny. I think we may suspect that, and that perhaps Ben got himself in trouble with Widmore’s people, but Ben’s obviously thinking about his mom (my mother taught me) so seeing Des and Penny with their son would make it too difficult for him to kill her, he hesitates, and then the mercenaries get the jump on him.

Of course, Ben killed all the mercenaries while Penny and Des got away, but that will be a good fight to watch. Even though this wasn’t a Ben episode, Ben stole this episode just by reading Ulysses on the plane. I wonder if he’d lost his copy years ago on the island, and made a special point of buying it to take back to the island.

I predict Sayid will have to kill that other guy on the plane. He’s the wolverine of the Lost-verse.

And Lost is comics related because like those comics many people consider to be the best (Sandman, Watchmen, American Flagg, Bone), Lost is a rich, layered character driven story told over a long serial span that incorporates speculative and fantastic elements and told in a tightly woven allegory utilizing nearly every tool of literature and film to create an intricate, compelling, and highly entertaining story.